DanBlanchflowe
Member
- Joined
- 18 Sep 2018
- Messages
- 81
Metro to introduce a winter timetable due to driver training being halted by lockdown | nexus.org.uk
The Tyne and Wear Metro is to operate a reduced frequency winter timetable while it catches up with driver training schools that were halted earlier this year due to lockdown. Nexus, the public body which owns and manages Metro, will introduce the new timetable from Sunday 29 November and it...
www.nexus.org.uk
This is appalling for us. The historic Town of South Shields with 75,000 population,+ Jarrow & Hebburn will be reduced to a half hour Sunday service. Sunderland & South Hylton service similarly affected. That is not a metro service. These towns/City are 10 -15 miles, through densely populated areas, from major Regional Hospital, RVI in Newcastle.The Tyne and Wear Metro is to operate a reduced frequency winter timetable while it catches up with driver training schools that were halted earlier this year due to lockdown.
Nexus, the public body which owns and manages Metro, will introduce the new timetable from Sunday 29 November and it will remain in place until March 2021.
Customers will still have access to a good level of service frequency across the network, say Nexus, with trains every seven minutes on weekdays from 7am to 6pm through Newcastle city centre and Gateshead.
Training across the UK rail industry was unable to take place during the first lockdown because national assessment centres that put candidates through the mandatory aptitude tests had to be closed.
This has impacted on the availability of Metro train crews, which is why a winter timetable is needed while 30 new recruits who started in September go through the six-month driver training school - the largest single intake since Metro began in 1980.
I understand that they have lost drivers to the main line companies, but I put this down to poor & slow recruitment management.
Their training programme last 6 months. Our Careers Forum says that their current recruitment drive started on 12 April 2019. So why were these drivers not recruited & trained by March 2020? A big question.
Last edited by a moderator: